Obama wins Maine for five in a row, as Clinton's campaign manager steps down...

CNN predict Barack Obama will win the Democratic caucus in Maine - giving him a clean sweep of all five contests over the weekend and putting him almost neck-and-neck with Hillary Clinton for the nomination.

Hillary is a narrowly ahead in numbers of delegates secured with 1,148 over Barack's 1,121. But he has won more states, and he clearly has the all-important momentum going into crucial contests tomorrow (Tuesday).

Hillary is reported to have lent her campaign $5 million last week and after her showing on the weekend she has 'replaced' her campaign manager.

The Democrat circus now heads for Maryland, the District of Columbia and crucially Virginia where battles take place tomorrow...

Meanwhile, John Edwards who dropped out of the race after Super Tuesday last week, is reported to be having meetings with both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, but he's keeping tight-lipped over which, if any, of the front-runners he will support.

Giuliani and Edwards to drop out...

CNN reporting:

1. John Edwards about to announce withdrawal from Democrat race. Will he back Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama...?

2. Rudy Giuliani about to drop out of Republican race and back John McCain.

Is Obama the new JFK...?

Barack Obama has created such incredible momentum in the US presidential race in Iowa that if he wins big in New Hampshire, the second state to choose it's candidate, he'll no doubt be hailed as the new John Fitzgerald Kennedy.

Are we really witnessing a historic moment not seen since Kennedy in the 1960s...? Is it premature to say Obama has launched a new movement that will change American politics...?

Maybe. Just maybe...

Plenty of early sensations in previous races for the White House burned out and disappeared back into obscurity. And this race has only just begun: the intense tests in the big states when the campaign will inevitably get nastier are still a long way off.

But I've just u-tubed Obama's victory speech in Iowa and watched it in full. Then again. It is certainly electric - and definitely JFK, maybe with a bit of Martin Luther King for good measure... (sorry, for some reason I had to upload the utube in a separate post, but do have a look...)

JFK or not, The Obama moment that took Iowa by storm already seems to be spreading to the next battleground of New Hampshire.

The influential Daily Kos blog reveals a massive surge for Senator Barack Obama in New Hampshire since Thursday.

Just a few days ago, former first lady Hillary Clinton was at least six points ahead in New Hampshire and most likely Democrat runner for the White House in November.

But in an astonishing turnround, two polls taken in the hours since Iowa give Obama a double-digit lead over Clinton in New Hampshire.

And Fox News says the Hillary Clinton operation has already run aground in New Hampshire.

A CNN poll published tonight by the Boston Herald says it's a dead heat.

Obama is on fire.

His Iowa victory speech may indeed be a moment in history...

Certainly, if he beats Hillary in New Hampshire by double-digits, she surely couldn't become the comeback kid that husband Bill proved to be in 1992...or could she?

Only time will tell.